My first anniversary with Dezmond arrived and I was happy about it. When I met Dezmond Holloway through a mutual friend, I didn’t really like him like that. Our first date didn’t go well, but I decided to give him another chance and I’ll never regret it. He made me smile and laugh harder than I’d smiled or laughed in years. I fell for him quicker than I thought I would. We moved in together after only three months of dating. Our connection was crazy at times. It was like he was my other half. Yet, the deeper in love with him I fell, the guiltier I felt inside.
The source of my guilt was someone who took everything from me. Just thinking about him was enough to ruin an entire day for me. His name was Omari Parker and he was my everything before I met Dezmond. Omari and I had known each other since middle school but didn’t realize we were attracted to each other until eleventh grade. Our mismatched friendship turned into a surprisingly solid relationship. I’d been aware of his bipolar disorder since we were in sixth grade, but I didn’t learn the depths of his struggle with the disorder until we began college. He’d been balanced up until that point and there really weren’t too many warning signs that something had gone terribly wrong. On most days, I wouldn’t even think about what happened. And then there were other days where it was all I could think about. The day of my first anniversary with Dezmond unexpectedly turned into one of those days.
“Who’s Omari?” Dezmond asked me while I was taking our clothes out of the dryer in our building’s laundry center.
I immediately froze up and looked at him before asking, “Where did you hear that name?”
“From you. Yesterday you were on the phone with Cassandra and…”
“You eavesdropped on my conversation? Wow Dez, I can’t believe you’d do that.”
“It was an accident, Chad.”
“Yeah, right.” I shook my head and went back to taking our clothes out of the dryer. “What all did you hear?”
“You told her that you had a dream about Omari and that he was trying to tell you something but no sound was coming from his mouth. Is he an ex?”
“I don’t think I’m ready for this conversation.”
“No, Dez. Now help me fold these clothes.”
He climbed down off of the washing machine he’d been sitting on and told me, “You know you can talk to me about anything. We’re a verse couple which means we get along better than most gay couples.” He laughed and I smirked at what he said.
“All I want to talk to you about today is our plans for our anniversary.”
“I’m down for whatever you’re down for, baby.” He kissed my cheek and then began to help me fold our clothes. “Mmm, these smell fresh.”
“I know, right? It’s a miracle I could get the funk out of your clothes.”
“Excuse you?” He laughed and started tickling me.
As much as I loved Dezmond, I wasn’t ready to talk to him about Omari. I first needed to get to a place where I could discuss what happened without crying or having a complete meltdown. I knew all Dezmond wanted to do was comfort me and get me through whatever problem I had, but I just couldn’t push myself to tell him everything. How could I tell him that I’d been battling depression off and on the entire time he and I have been together? How could I tell him that I was still in love with my first love? Would he understand the reason why I will only sleep on the left side of our bed or why I keep the promise ring Omari gave me in twelfth grade on my finger? It all seemed like too much to explain to him so I pushed it off yet again.
“You’re tired?” he asked me as I climbed into our bed and lied down. “I thought we were gonna spend the day doing fun stuff.”
“I just need a nap,” I told him. “You woke me up kinda early.”
“Yeah because I made you breakfast in bed.” He sat down on his side of the bed and looked at me.
“Why are you looking at me like that?”
“Because I love you. And I love you so much that I can tell when something is wrong.”
“Nothing is wrong, Dezmond. It’s our first anniversary and I’m happy.”
“Chadwick Nathaniel Fulton, I cannot be fooled. You were happy until I asked you who this Omari person was.”
“Dez, just drop it. Please.”
“No. You know everything about me and I feel like I only know your full name.” He laughed a little. “Do you know how hard it was for me to tell you my parents kicked me out of the house at age fifteen and I was homeless for a long time? I’m still ashamed of that to this day, baby.”
“I know but there’s some things that aren’t easy to talk about. Not even with the person you love.”
“So we can get matching tattoos but we can’t talk about stuff that happened to us? Baby, you never know how much we can help each other just by talking. And on today of all days, we should want to be open with each other.” He paused and waited for me to say something. When I didn’t, he continued, “How about this, you tell me who Omari is and I’ll tell you the real reason why my parents kicked me out of the house.”
“What are you talking about? You told me they threw you out because you’re gay.”
“They learned that I’m gay from an uncle who saw me leaving a gay club when I was nineteen. They threw me out at fifteen for a totally different reason.”
“You’re keeping the truth about this Omari person from me.”
I sighed and admitted, “Okay, you have a point.”
“So you’re going to tell me?”
“If I can manage to get through it.” I already felt myself getting choked up as I sat up against the headboard. “This isn’t easy for me, baby.”
“I’m here for you.” He grabbed my hand. “Take your time.”
I took a deep breath before telling him, “Omari Parker was my first boyfriend. He was my first love. We’d been friends since middle school but when we got to high school, things changed. We finally became serious in the eleventh grade and it was like sparks flying. It was beautiful and so right on time. And I didn’t even…” I stopped as tears filled my eyes. “I knew I wouldn’t be able to do this.”
“Baby, it’s okay. Look at me. Look into my eyes, Chad.” I looked into his comforting hazel eyes. “I am here to help you. You have to believe in me the way I believe in you. Trust me, I can help.”
“Okay.” I wiped my eyes and calmed down. “After high school, we both enrolled into the same college. At first, everything was fine. It wasn’t until our second semester there that things just started to go wrong. He started having trouble managing his bipolar symptoms. I thought he was off his meds but he was taking them. They just stopped working the way they used to. I wanted to get him help but he kept insisting that I let him work his way through it. He’d have these moments of clarity where he was one hundred percent the man that I knew. And then there were…other moments.”
“I once came to his dorm and found him sitting in a tub full of water with all of his clothes on. He’d hooked the toaster up in the bathroom and…I don’t even wanna think about what he would’ve done had I not shown up in that moment. After that, I knew what I had to do. I went to a counselor at the student health center and they had to have Omari committed to a mental health facility out of town.”
“That must’ve been hard.”
“It was the toughest thing I had to witness in my life. He was so angry at me. His parents thanked me though.”
“So, what happened after he was committed?”
“They were able to balance him out again but something just wasn’t right. The light in his eyes wasn’t there anymore. He just wasn’t the same and I could feel it. The meds they had him on kept him from having mood swings and they completely stopped the erratic behavior, but he was depressed. He was so depressed and I could feel him slipping away from me. No matter how hard I loved him or how many things we did together, he just wasn’t himself anymore.”
“Chadwick, what happened to him?”
“We were back home in Maryland for summer break and all of a sudden, he wanted to spend time with me. He still wasn’t himself but we made love a lot of times and cuddled. He kept telling me that everything was going to be alright. One night, he came over while my parents were out and we just cuddled in my bed for hours. We made plans to go to the movies the next day and then he left. That was the last time I saw him alive.” I got choked up again and had to grab my stomach because it felt like I was going to throw up. I was reliving every moment and it hurt.
“He’s dead? Oh baby, I’m so sorry.”
“He went home that night and took almost all of the pills in his parents’ bathroom. I don’t know what made him do it. I mean, I know the disorder played a role but I just felt so useless. I still feel that way. I couldn’t help him and he was my everything, Dez. He was my everything.” I cried and Dezmond wrapped his arms around me.
“I’m so sorry, Chad. No one should have to go through something that heartbreaking.”
I pulled away from him and told him, “I’ve been working on getting over Omari and what happened but it’s so hard. I love you, Dezmond. You know how I feel about you. But I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to truly move on.”
“I may be able to help you move on.”
When he said that, I looked at him and asked, “How?”
“Do you remember what I said about the real reason why my parents kicked me out?”
“They kicked me out because…I’m not like most people, Chad. There’s something about me that I’ve learned to keep secret from people unless I know that I can trust them.” He took a deep breath before revealing, “I can talk to dead people.”
I sat there silently looking at him before bursting out in laughter. “Okay, if that’s your way of getting me to stop talking about Omari, then it worked.” I wiped my eyes and laughed again.
“I’m serious, Chad. If I pick something up that belonged to someone or has meaning to someone who is now dead, I can hear them. I can’t hear everything and I can’t see them, but I can hear them. When I was really young, I thought I was hearing imaginary people or that it was make-believe but as I got older, I realized my gift. It scared the hell out of me but I’ve been able to help a lot of people and this gift has made my life worthwhile.”
“Dezmond, you’re scaring me.”
“I know and I’m sorry about that but I need you to believe me. My parents did not throw me out because I’m gay. They were very religious but it wasn’t because I’m gay. They thought I had a demon in me because every time I picked up my late grandma’s cane in the living room, she spoke to me. And I’d tell them what she was saying and they’d call the pastor over. They didn’t believe me and eventually they made me leave their house.”
“Why are you just now telling me this? We’ve been together for a year now.”
“I was going to wait until I felt like the time was right but now I see the right time is now.” He looked around. “Is there anything in this room or this apartment that belonged to him? A jacket or a wallet? Anything?”
“No, his parents got all of his stuff back in Maryland. Dezmond, this is crazy.”
“I know how it sounds, but I can prove it to you. I just need one thing he cared about. Did he give you something meaningful?”
“I don’t know. Maybe…” I lifted my left hand and that’s when I remembered the promise ring. “This. He gave me this promise ring back in high school.”
“I’m not sure if I want to do this.”
“If it gets too weird or if you can’t handle it, then I’ll stop.”
I thought about it for a little while before slowly removing the ring from my finger and placing it in Dezmond’s hands. The moment I placed it in his hands, his eyes lit up and he let out a long-winded gasp. He stood up and walked around in a small circle for a few minutes and then stopped. I stood up because I wasn’t sure if he was about to leave the room or stay. Out of nowhere, I felt a very cool breeze flow through the room.
“He’s here,” he told me. “He’s in this bedroom with us right now.”
I wasn’t sure if I believed in what he was doing, but I did have a strange feeling. It was making the hairs stand up on the back of my neck. “Can he hear me?”
“Yes, he can hear and see you.” He paused for a short while before saying, “He keeps saying bed. I don’t know what he’s trying to tell me.” He closed his eyes. “He’s saying bed and side.”
“My side of the bed? He used to always sleep on the right side and I slept on the left whenever we spent the night together. Can I ask him something?”
“Omari, if you’re really here then tell me…well tell Dezmond what you were wearing the last time I saw you at my house back in Maryland. I remember every single detail about you that day. What were you wearing, baby?”
Dezmond closed his eyes and quietly replied, “He says he was wearing a wife beater, khaki shorts and a white Run–D.M.C. cap. He’s saying he wore the cap because he didn’t have a haircut.”
When Dezmond relayed that message for Omari, I realized that this was real and he indeed was speaking to my dead lover. Omari was supposed to get a haircut the next day before our date to the movies, so he wore that Run-D.M.C. cap that day. And he was wearing a wife beater and khaki shorts. As if I’d been punched in the gut, I grabbed my stomach and sat down because my knees got weak. My fear subsided but I still didn’t know how to feel about this whole thing. I wasn’t sure I could handle what Omari had to say.
“He’s saying party,” Dezmond continued. “I think he’s saying warming party.”
“Housewarming party?” I asked.
“Yes, housewarming party. He’s saying housewarming party and I can’t make out the other word. Might or mate, I think.”
My eyes lit up and I asked, “The housewarming party? Cassandra’s housewarming party? Dezmond, that’s where you and I met. He knows about that?”
“He says he was jealous. Okay, now he’s saying doctor piper. No, pepper. Dr. Pepper, the soda.”
It took me a little while to remember me and Dezmond’s first date. “Oh my God, it was him. Dez, remember our first date at Chili’s? Your glass of Dr. Pepper turned over on me. He did that?”
“He says he’s sorry. He was jealous. He knew because of housewarming party.”
“Is he saying he knew before you and I met that we’d be together?”
“Yes. He’s saying sorry again.”
“I forgive you, Omari. I understand why you were jealous. You didn’t even like it when I made new male friends.”
“No, he’s saying sorry for something different.” He froze and his eyes widened. “Pills.”
That’s when I finally felt like I could take it. I had to know why he did what he did. I had to know if he knew how bad it would make me feel, and that he left me. I approached Dezmond and touched his hand and to my surprise, tears filled his eyes. “What’s wrong?”
“I can hear him more clearly now. Chad, I’ve never been able to hear a spirit speak like this.” He paused for a second. “He wants you to know that he couldn’t go on any more like that. He was in a lot of pain.”
“I could’ve helped you, Omari. You know how much I loved you.”
“He says that the disease won. He was hearing voices.”
“Oh my God.” Tears rolled down my face and I quickly wiped them. “There were counselors that could’ve helped.”
“He’s saying no. It was too severe.”
“They could’ve helped him! He’d been suicidal before and they helped him!”
“He’s saying he wasn’t just suicidal by that point. He was hearing voices telling him to kill you. And even though he couldn’t stop the voices, he says he knew that he could never hurt you and the thought of possibly hurting you…it made him want to end it all.”
I sobbed and asked, “Why did he make plans with me to go to the movies then? I don’t understand. Why did he do it?”
“He says you knew him best and if he didn’t tell you he’d see you the next day, you would’ve known something was wrong. He didn’t want to hurt you.”
“Well, he did hurt me! You hurt me, Omari!”
“You have to understand.”
“He’s saying you have to understand. He wasn’t himself anymore. The only thing keeping him on this earth was you and your love. Once his mind began telling him to harm you, he says it had to end.” He paused for a short while before saying, “He wants you to know that…”
“What? He wants me to know what?”
“His voice is fading. I’m starting to hear him less.” He waited for a few seconds. “He’s saying you asked him something when you were alone in the church after his funeral. The answer is: always and forever.” He exhaled and told me, “He’s gone.” He placed the ring back in my hand. “Baby, what did you ask him in the church?”
Choked up, I wiped my eyes and replied, “I asked him if he still loved me. I used to ask him that after we had an argument and he’d give me the same answer, always and forever. Dezmond, thank you.”
I broke down and Dezmond held me. I’d never experienced something that surreal before in my life. A part of me was still upset with Omari but as I thought about the things he’d said through Dezmond, I realized just how bad his mental state had gotten. He really was in pain and there was nothing I could do to help him. There was nothing his family could do besides institutionalize him and there’s no way he would’ve been okay with that. Still, I was grateful of Dezmond and his ability. Many people lose love ones and never get real closure.
“Are you mad at me for still loving him?” I asked Dezmond later that night as we prepared for a dinner party with our friends to celebrate our anniversary.
“No, of course not,” he answered. “I understand that you two had something special and I would never want you to deny that.”
“He sort of gave us his blessing.”
“So, what happens to him now? Will he ever communicate through you again?”
“Only if you want him to. For now, he’s in a different world. He’ll only come around if you strongly yearn for him.”
“And how will I know he’s here?”
“Unless you let me hold the ring when he’s here, you won’t know. But baby, that’s not the important thing. The important thing is that he’ll always be with you in one way or another. And he wants you to be happy. Do I make you happy?”
“The only way you can satisfy him is by living. He wants you to live. He wants you to enjoy each and every moment you have here.” He kissed me. “Now, let’s check on that chicken.” He was about to turn to the oven but I grabbed his hand. “What is it, baby?”
“I just wanted to say I love you.”
He smiled and said, “And I love you. Always and forever.”
[Disclaimer]: Pictures used do not reflect the sexuality or personality of people in the pictures. They only serve as visual examples of the characters.
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